WD-L

WARDOGS WD-L020 and the other "Unable to launch" WD-L error codes

Published 11 Sept 2026Updated 12 Oct 2026Data as of Season 2 · 15 Oct 2026

This one is on your machine

Update 0.1.2, deployed on 30 September, fixed WD-L020 for most players by patching the clash with Windows 11 update KB5124010, so update WARDOGS through Steam first. Players are still reporting WD-L020 after that patch, and for some of them uninstalling KB5124010 and repairing Elytra got the game launching again. Team17 says it is working on fixes for WD-L014 and WD-L018; if you run Kaspersky and get WD-L018, exclude the game from it. WD-L004, WD-L006, WD-L007, WD-L009 and WD-L010 have no published cause, and repairing the anti-cheat from the game folder is what has worked most often for those.

What you see

The launcher runs for a few seconds and stops with "Unable to launch WARDOGS. Error code: WD-L014-8725400ca4fe", or the same sentence with a different code and a different string of characters after it. The game itself never starts.

Also reported as: wd-l004 · wd-l006 · wd-l007 · wd-l009 · wd-l010 · wd-l014 · wd-l018 · wd-l020 · unable to launch wardogs · unable to launch wardogs error code · wardogs launcher error · kb5124010 · certificate signature cannot be verified

Fixes, in the order worth trying

Work top to bottom and stop when the game launches. Each step is labelled with how much evidence sits behind it, so you can skip the guesses if the first ones work.

01 Ignore everything after the code itself
Confirmed
WD-L014-8725400ca4fe and WD-L014-474eb079e144 are the same error. The trailing string is generated per machine and changes between attempts on the same PC — one player watching it noted the numbers were different every time they tried. Searching your full code finds nothing because nobody else has ever seen it. Search and report the prefix.
02 If your code is WD-L020, update WARDOGS to 0.1.2
Confirmed
Bulkhead deployed Update 0.1.2 on 30 September, and its patch notes say it "Fixed the issue caused by the latest Windows 11 update, KB5124010, causing the recent WD-L020 crashes." Restart Steam so the update downloads, check the game shows no pending update in your library, then launch. You do not need to uninstall KB5124010 any more, and if you paused Windows Update to keep it off, you can resume updates.
03 If WD-L020 still appears after updating
Reported
It still happens. Players on Steam Discussions were reporting WD-L020 every day from 5 to 12 October, well after 0.1.2, including one on Windows 10 who never had KB5124010. Two of them got back in by uninstalling KB5124010 (Start → Settings → Windows Update → Update history → Uninstall updates, or wusa /uninstall /kb:5124010 in an administrator Command Prompt), then running the Elytra repair (below) and restarting. That was the official workaround before 0.1.2: Team17 posted it on 23 September and the WARDOGS Updates account repeated it on X (x.com/WARDOGSUpdates/status/2102736258690695304). One player whose PC did not have the update at all installed KB5124010, uninstalled it, repaired Elytra and reinstalled WARDOGS, and that worked. Another player tried the same thing and it did not work. Team17 has said nothing about WD-L020 since 0.1.2. If you are still stuck, post in the pinned WD-L020 thread on Steam with the code prefix and your Windows build from winver.
04 If your code is WD-L018 (common since Update 0.1.2), check your antivirus
Reported
WD-L018 jumped on 30 September, straight after Update 0.1.2, on machines that launched fine the night before. Team17 acknowledged it that day and says a fix is in development, but there is no fix yet. Several players on the Steam thread were running Kaspersky, which deleted a game file every time they verified. What fixed it for two of them: add the WARDOGS game folder to Kaspersky's file exclusions, add the WARDOGS launcher to its application exclusions with "Don't analyse files opened by the app", "Don't watch app activity" and "Don't watch child app activity" ticked, then verify files (about 223 MB downloads). One player also found the error cleared on its own an hour after the update. MP1st's write-up of the community fix adds that you should run Elytra-Setup.exe as administrator when you choose Repair, then restart the PC, then verify files; for Kaspersky, the file to trust is WardogsClient-Win64-Shipping.exe. If you do not run Kaspersky, try the Elytra repair below.
05 If your code is WD-L009 ("Certificate signature cannot be verified"), reinstall the Visual C++ and DirectX runtimes
Unconfirmed
WD-L009 has been reported on Steam since launch day, in at least eight threads. Some versions of the dialog add "Certificate signature cannot be verified", which means Windows would not accept the digital signature on a file the launcher checks. Team17 has not said what causes it. The only fix anyone has reported is from one player: reinstalling the Microsoft Visual C++ redistributables and DirectX. Another player on 12 October tried an Elytra repair, a clean Elytra reinstall, running as administrator, verifying files and reinstalling root certificates, and still got the error. Try the runtimes first, then the Elytra repair below.
06 If your code is WD-L010 on Windows 10, check Secure Boot
Unconfirmed
A player wrote to us that on Windows 10, WD-L010 came from Secure Boot being off, and that nothing else fixed it. Check in Start, System Information, "Secure Boot State". Turning it on can need the system drive converted to UEFI/GPT, which is a big job with a real risk to your data, so treat this as the last thing to try and back up first. One report, not confirmed elsewhere yet.
07 If you are on a Windows 11 Insider build, leave the Insider program
Reported
Run winver first: an Insider Preview build says so in the window. On 12 September players on Insider Preview build 26220.9472 started getting WD-L codes, WD-L020 among them, on machines that had launched the game the day before. Settings → Windows Update → Windows Insider Program → stop getting preview builds, then run Windows Update. Players who did that and landed back on the regular 25H2 release (build 26200.9445) had the launcher working again, and several more confirmed the same route. One player who went back to 25H2 still had the error, so this is the fix for Insider machines, not for everyone.
08 Repair the anti-cheat from the game folder, then verify files, then reboot
Reported
Steam library → right-click WARDOGS → Manage → Browse local files → open the Elytra folder → run Elytra-Setup.exe → Repair. Let it finish, then verify integrity of game files in Steam, then restart the PC before trying again. This is the most-reported working sequence, and it is also the one that most visibly does not work for everyone: players have posted it as their fix and other players have posted that they tried it and got the same code back.
09 On Windows 11, turn off Memory Integrity
Reported
Windows Security → Device security → Core isolation details → turn Memory Integrity off, restart, then verify game files. A kernel-level anti-cheat and core isolation are the two things on a Windows machine most likely to disagree, and this cleared the error for at least one player. It weakens a real Windows protection, so turn it back on if it changes nothing.
10 Uninstall the old WARDOGS Playtest if it is still on the machine
Reported
The betas shipped as a separate Steam application and some players still have it installed. Removing it is reported as the fix by a player who had tried the anti-cheat repair first, and it costs nothing — the playtest build is dead.
11 Update the graphics driver, cleanly
Reported
This is the first thing Team17 support asks for once it has your DxDiag, AMD cards especially: get the driver from the vendor rather than through Windows Update, then restart. It is a low-yield step — the player it was asked of came back to say the error was unchanged — but it is also the step support will ask you to do before looking further.
12 Run sfc /scannow as administrator
Reported
Team17's second ask after reading a DxDiag: Start → type cmd → right-click Command Prompt → Run as administrator → sfc /scannow → Enter. It repairs Windows system files rather than anything belonging to WARDOGS, which is a fair description of where support believes this fault lives.
13 Report it with the code prefix and a DxDiag
Confirmed
If none of the above moves it, the Report a Problem board on Steam is where Team17 answers, usually within a day and usually by asking for DxDiag output first. Post the prefix, the exact launcher wording, your GPU and whether you are on Windows 10 or 11. Enough of those in one place is what gets a code documented.

Did this fix it for you?

Notes from other players who hit this code. Say what worked, what did not, and which region you are in — a fix that only works in one place is worth knowing about. Best-rated first, and there is no time limit: an answer from the first beta is still an answer.

No comments yet. Be the first to say whether this worked.

Eight prefixes are in circulation: WD-L004, WD-L006, WD-L007, WD-L009, WD-L010, WD-L014, WD-L018 and WD-L020. Team17 has published a cause for only one of them, and the dialog itself just tells you to contact support with the code. That one is WD-L020: Team17 pinned its cause, a Windows update, on 23 September, and Bulkhead shipped a fix in Update 0.1.2 on 30 September. It did not fix it for everyone. Team17 has also acknowledged WD-L014 and WD-L018 and says fixes for both are in development, but it has not said what causes them.

The hash is not part of the error

The single most useful thing on this page. The code comes as WD-L0xx-<string>, and that string is generated on your machine: two players holding WD-L014 posted 8725400ca4fe and 474eb079e144, and a third watching their own attempts said the trailing numbers changed every time. So a search for the whole thing returns nothing, every time, for everybody — which is why this error feels undocumented even though hundreds of people have it. The prefix is the error. The rest is a reference number for a support ticket.

What the codes mean

For WD-L020: a specific, confirmed cause. Team17 support's own words, from the pinned Steam Discussions post: "a potential compatibility issue related to the latest Windows 11 update, KB5124010." Microsoft lists KB5124010 as a 22 September preview update for Windows 11 24H2 and 25H2 — not a routine security patch, which is why it caught players who never touched the Insider program. For a week the only workaround was uninstalling it. On 29 September Bulkhead's CEO Joe Brammer said in a video on X that this error was the biggest single reason Steam reviews were falling, and the next morning Update 0.1.2 fixed it on the game's side: "Fixed the issue caused by the latest Windows 11 update, KB5124010, causing the recent WD-L020 crashes." Update the game first.

That fix has not reached everyone. From 5 to 12 October players kept posting new WD-L020 threads on Steam. One player has not been able to play since the error began, another was refused a refund because they had more than two hours of play, and at least one player gets it on Windows 10, which KB5124010 does not touch. What got two of them back in was the old workaround: remove KB5124010, repair Elytra, restart. Team17 has not posted about WD-L020 since 0.1.2, so if you have updated and still see it, try that before anything else.

For WD-L014 and WD-L018: Team17 support posted on 30 September that "We're aware of launch issues pertaining to error codes WD-L014 and WD-L018" and that fixes are in development. It has posted no update since, and Season 2 on 15 October is the next patch. WD-L018 jumped within hours of Update 0.1.2, on machines that had launched the night before. No cause is published. The pattern on the Steam thread points at antivirus, Kaspersky in particular, removing a file the patched launcher needs; excluding the game fixed it for two players. It is the step above.

For WD-L009: reported since launch day and sometimes shown with "Certificate signature cannot be verified", meaning Windows rejected the signature on a file the launcher checks. That tells you what failed but not why, and Team17 has not said.

For WD-L004, WD-L006, WD-L007 and WD-L010: still nothing published, and nothing inferable from how support answers them. The same request — send a DxDiag — goes to each alike, and the follow-up differs by what the DxDiag shows rather than by the code: a driver update for an AMD card on one, sfc /scannow on another. Neither resolved the thread it was posted in.

If those codes do sort by cause, the public record does not show it yet. The rest of this page is arranged by what has fixed the error for someone rather than by which number you are holding, because that is the only ordering the evidence supports.

What has actually worked

Updating to 0.1.2, for WD-L020. The official fix, deployed 30 September. If it did not work for you, uninstalling KB5124010 and repairing Elytra is what has worked since, for a few players.
Leaving the Windows Insider program. A separate, earlier pattern from 12 September: Insider Preview build 26220.9472 stopped launching the game overnight, and the regular 25H2 release launched it again. This is a different trigger from KB5124010 and only applies if winver shows an Insider build.
The Elytra repair, in the game folder, followed by a verify and a reboot. Reported as the fix most often and reported as useless almost as often. The reboot is the step people skip.
Turning off Memory Integrity on Windows 11. One clear success, and it is the kind of conflict a kernel anti-cheat produces.
Removing the old Playtest install. One success, after the Elytra repair had failed.
A full reinstall. It has worked, and on launch night it cost the player a 210,000-place queue to get back in. Keep it last.

And what has not: verifying files alone, running as administrator, rolling Windows back, and toggling Secure Boot were all tried in one evening by a player who finished the list still holding the same code.

If the game starts and then fails

Then this is the wrong page. A launcher error stops before the game window exists. If WARDOGS opens and crashes, start at crash on launch; if it is the anti-cheat refusing the executable by name, that is its own fault; and if you reach a login queue at all, nothing here applies — you are past the launcher and into the server-side faults.

And if the dialog names Invalid Game Executable Path rather than a WD-L code, that is a separate message with a separate cause — usually a corrupted or incomplete install, rather than anything the codes above cover.

Source

Bulkhead, "WARDOGS | Update 0.1.2 (Minor Patch)", Steam, 30 September 2026 ↗